Prior to last Thursday night (April 17, 2014), I had never seen The Hold Steady or Deer Tick live. Hell, I had only ever heard a couple of their songs. But, I had the chance to photograph their show at the House of Blues Boston, so I took the opportunity and ran with it.

This was the first time I've photographed headlining bands (this was basically if not officially a co-headlining show) without knowing a decent amount of their work. This time, I knew that Deer Tick was local, and has quite the following around these parts; I knew that, according to their Facebook page, The Hold Steady is "straight up Rock&Roll." Nothing else. It was nerve

Providence natives Deer Tick opened the night. If I'm being completely honest, I wasn't impressed... at least not until the final three songs of their set. They killed it. The audience loved it, they were having a blast, and the songs themselves were the best of the set. They ended up being exactly what I expected; a solid, crowd-pleasing act.

Then it was time for The Hold Steady. Wow.

To be completely honest, I wasn't all too crazy about the songs that I had listened to prior to this show. The sound was good, but the vocals didn't quite click with me. Live, however, it all clicked. The energy, the attitude; it was all contagious and played brilliantly in the club environment. They killed it up there; a perfect punk'n'roll hybrid that was a complete blast watch/shoot.

Check out the slideshow for selected photos from the show. For more from the show in the coming days, follow my Tumblr over at Through Digital Eyes.

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Timothy Patrick Boyer is a writer/photographer from Southeastern Massachusetts. He has a degree in English from the University of Massachusetts in Dartmouth and has been passionate about the Providence/Boston Concert scene for 10+ years. Timothy will never (never) apologize for his headlines. Find more photography from Timothy on his site, Through Digital Eyes, or like his page on Facebook. Timothy can be reached at throughdigitaleyes@yahoo.com.